Arterial blood pressure following different types of urinary stone therapy- Presented at the 8th European Symposium on Urolithiasis, Parma, Italy, 1999

Objective: Several studies reported increased blood pressure (BP) values fo llowing extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy (ESWL) treatment of renal sto nes. It is unclear, however, whether this is due to ESWL, since nephrolithi asis itself increases the relative risk of developing hypertension. Therefo re we prospectively studied the BPs of stone patients undergoing different types of treatment. Methods: 252 stone patients (63% males, 37% females, median age 44.3, range 11.7-86.4 years) participated. 168 suffered from uretral stones: 50 underw ent ESWL; 40 ureteroscopy, and 78 patients passed stones spontaneously (SP) . 84 had renal stones: 60 underwent ESWL; 8 percutaneous nephrolithotomy/op en surgery, and 16 no treatment. Systolic (SBP) and diastolic (DBP) BP were measured according to Riva-Rocci prior to, immediately after, and 3, 6, 12 , 18 and 24 months after stone therapy. Results: Immediately after SP, SEP decreases, whereas after active stone tr eatment increases (highest after ESWL) in SEP were seen. DBP was unchanged. During the further follow-up, a gradual increase in BP was observed in all groups. At 24 months in all groups, regardless of the stone location and t ype of treatment, SEP and DBP were significantly higher than the pretreatme nt levels (p = 0.000). There was no a difference between renal and ureteral stones, or between the ESWL treatment and the other groups. Conclusion: Renal stone disease itself rather than the type of treatment si gnificantly increases SEP and DBP during a follow-up period of 24 months. T he underlying mechanisms remain to be elucidated. Copyright (C) 2000 S. Kar ger AG, Basel.